June 12, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias I’m Tired Again, and I’m Sure You’ve Been There Are you tired? Really tired? Me, too. Most of us with multiple sclerosis are. How many is most? A small new study of 44 people with one of the progressive forms of MS found that the answer is…
June 8, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Ofatumumab, Zeposia, Early Symptoms, New App FDA Extends Review of Ofatumumab for Relapsing MS to September The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was expected to make a decision about ofatumumab, a self-administered injection of a monoclonal antibody, by this month. Now, it looks…
June 5, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias Another Medication, Zeposia, Joins the MS Treatment Arsenal By my unofficial count, disease-modifying therapy No. 19 has just become available to people with multiple sclerosis in the U.S. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Zeposia (ozanimod) in late March. While pharmaceutical companies usually rush…
June 1, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Pollution and MS, ATA188, Ofatumumab, Zeposia Air Pollution of Urban Life Raises MS Risk, Study from Italy Suggests I grew up in New York City. It’s hard to get more urban than that. There weren’t many factories spewing pollution, but…
May 29, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias Am I Having an MS Relapse? As I sit down to write this week’s column, it’s hard for me to concentrate. I’d planned to write about new MS mobile apps, but I can’t get my brain to focus on the task. I’ve been bragging about…
May 26, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Vascular Disease, Glatopa vs. Copaxone, Exercise Tips, MS App Higher Risk of Vascular Disease Among MS Patients in the UK, Population-based Study Reveals You’d think that people with multiple sclerosis (MS) would be likely to have vascular disease due to the sedentary lifestyles many of us lead.
May 22, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias Giving My Laptop the Weekend Off My favorite line in the “Downton Abbey” TV series, uttered by the dowager played by Maggie Smith, is “What’s a weekend?” When you’re retired, if you’re working as a freelancer, or if like me you’re doing both, it’s easy…
May 18, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: COVID-19 Data, Epstein-Barr, PoNS Device, Mindfulness COVID-19 May Not Be Severe in MS Patients, Early Data from Italy Suggest Keep in mind that COVID-19 information is dynamic. New data about this illness appear every day. But all information I’ve seen so far agrees with…
May 15, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias More Evidence Links Epstein-Barr Virus to MS More support has been added to the belief that a link exists between the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and multiple sclerosis (MS). Epstein-Barr is one of the most common viruses, and most people become infected with it at some…
May 11, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Bafiertam, Stem Cell Transplant Damage, Gilenya Study, NurOwn Benefits FDA Approves Bafiertam, Tecfidera Bioequivalent, for Relapsing MS This is the second disease-modifying therapy (DMT) OK’d by the FDA in the past few months. Bafiertam is a delayed-release pill that’s similar to Tecfidera, but it’s said that it…
May 8, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias A Good News Story About an MS Treatment I love it when a multiple sclerosis treatment works well for someone. It doesn’t matter if that treatment is a medication, a form of physical therapy, or a diet. Good news is good news. So, when I saw this…
May 4, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Diagnosis by Antibody, Ocrevus After 6 Years, Telemedicine, New DMT Pill New Nanosensor May Help to Diagnose MS at Early Stages My neurologist likes to say that “brain is time.” The sooner MS is treated the more time you can buy before the brain begins to deteriorate and MS…
May 1, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias How Has COVID-19 Affected Your MS Life? I canceled my April blood draw. The protocol for Lemtrada (alemtuzumab) requires lab work each month because the treatment can have serious side effects. But I spoke with my neurologist and we decided that I could skip it. Blame…
April 27, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Ocrevus Infusion Time, Monocytes as a Therapy Target, MS and Work Shorter Ocrevus Infusion Time Up for Approval in US and Europe One of the drawbacks to infusion therapies is the time a patient spends in a recliner receiving the medication. For Ocrevus (ocrelizumab), nearly half a day is…
April 24, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias COVID-19, Joey Cocker, and Me It’s comforting to have this guy, with his floppy ears, stretched out next to me as I sit here writing. I don’t know why, but the fact that Joey, who is really my wife Laura’s cocker spaniel, has chosen…
April 20, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Fampyra, COVID-19, Vitamin D, Neurodegeneration Fampyra, Aid for Walking, Favored for Inclusion in NHS Scotland I used Ampyra, as Fampyra is known in the U.S., for about a year. It improved my walking a little, but I had to…
April 17, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias A Snapshot of COVID-19 and Disease-modifying Therapies Are people with MS more susceptible than the average person to the coronavirus that causes COVID-19? And if COVID-19 attacks them, what’s the likely course of their illness? What about COVID-19 and disease-modifying therapies? Doctors from around the…
April 13, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: COVID-19 Database, ATA188 Trial Postponed, Teen Smoking, Myelin and Fruit Peels New Database to Compile COVID-19 Data About People with MS and Related Diseases There are databases in the U.K. and other parts of Europe for tracking people with MS who have tested positive for…
April 10, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias My Lemtrada Journey, 2 Years After My Second Round Happy Lemtrada anniversary to me! It’s been two years since I completed my second round of Lemtrada (alemtuzumab) infusions, and I’m happy to say that the results have been good. Not everyone’s experience with Lemtrada will mirror mine, but…
April 6, 2020 Columns by Ed Tobias MS News that Caught My Eye Last Week: Exercise, Diet, and Myelin Regular Exercise ‘Strongly Recommended’ to Ease Fatigue in MS This may seem like a no-brainer. But once upon a time, neurologists told people with MS to avoid exercise. They told us it would overheat…
April 29, 2024 Columns by Leigh Anne Nelson My biggest worry post-diagnosis was whether MS could be inherited
April 25, 2024 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister Finding safety while living with the constant threat of MS progression